TRANSPARENCY

Countries such as Iran, India and China proposed initiatives to limit the market of tobacco and further enforce plain packaging regulations. Many of these initiatives were adopted and will have to be enforced by Canada as a party to the convention. But at no point did the Canadian people get a say.

We write with respect to the saga at the York Region District School Board (YRDSB) over alleged Islamophobic posts by principal Ghada Sadaka. We join the parents who are deeply concerned about the mental and physical well-being of their children.

Ontario's Liberal government's deeply ingrained struggles with honesty and transparency continue to taint their governing legacy. That struggle is most pronounced in the Liberal's ongoing war with Ontario's Independent Officers of the Legislature, who are tasked with holding government and provincial agencies accountable.

He won't talk about his government's non-progressive policies, but man does he ever look good with his shirt off. This calculation is duplicitous; it showcases an accessible leader but one with little time to get into the specifics of the policies that run counter to Trudeau's reputation of a real progressive. It is the best of Trudeau, it is the worst of Trudeau, and until his gushing fans and the complicit media start doing their jobs by demanding transparency, we will be stuck having to tolerate both.

The Access to Information, Ethics and Privacy Committee dropped a major report last week before wrapping up for the summer. Unanimously approved by the multi-partisan committee, the report pushes the Trudeau government to make some serious and long-overdue changes to the law.

Sites like Google and Amazon have blazed a path for consumers' high expectations around information access and transparency, generating consumer demand for transparency around pricing and other factors involved in the purchase decision. This demand for transparency is now transforming entire industries.

I believe the public should know how taxes are spent. More importantly, the public should know their money is wisely spent. With physician billings, though, I think we're chasing the wrong number. Billings are a crude, misleading measure of value for money. In isolation, they cannot and do not tell the story we need to hear.

The impact of not being honest and truthful from the beginning can be devastating to a company's reputation, and in some cases, their entire business. As a result, we've seen established organizations attempt to appease their customers by pre-emptively disclosing information that never would have been released in the past.

This may come as a shock to some readers: Teachers are human beings -- nearly all of them. This means that, like the rest of us, they make mistakes, behave badly, and sometimes just lose it. It also means that, like the rest of us, most teachers are basically good and honest people who work hard to do a very difficult job. But some are not. And the ones who are not should not be teaching.

When most communities in B.C. have more in-camera meetings than the City of Toronto, there's a problem. In Ontario, councils are entitled to go in-camera to consider six specific matters. There are four reasons that councils must go in camera and over a dozen reasons why they "may" close a meeting. The nuance between "may" and "must" seems to have been lost on a few.

The extent to which the Liberal government takes seriously its response to these petitions will demonstrate how much it embraces openness and accountability, whether or not it chooses to support or oppose these requests. In two years, the Trudeau government is scheduled to review how the new system is working and how it might be improved. In my view, the prime minister should put in the measures found in my original motion where e-petitions gaining a high level of public support, say 100,000 signatures, could trigger debates in the House of Commons.

Openness and transparency permeates the mandate letters issued to members of cabinet by Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and is a recurring theme in statements by his government. In fact, it is the only theme next to climate change so far. But what does openness mean for development assistance?